Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolvingAnd revolving at nine hundred miles an hour,That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,A sun that is the source of all our power.The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can seeAre moving at a million miles a dayIn an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour,Of the galaxy we call the 'Milky Way'.

Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars.It's a hundred thousand light years side to side.It bulges in the middle, sixteen thousand light years thick,But out by us, it's just three thousand light years wide.We're thirty thousand light years from galactic central point.We go 'round every two hundred million years,And our galaxy is only one of millions of billionsIn this amazing and expanding universe.

The universe itself keeps on expanding and expandingIn all of the directions it can whizzAs fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know,Twelve million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there is.So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,How amazingly unlikely is your birth,And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth.

Angry Drunk Bureaucrat:Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolvingAnd revolving at nine hundred miles an hour,That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,A sun that is the source of all our power.The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can seeAre moving at a million miles a dayIn an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour,Of the galaxy we call the 'Milky Way'.

Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars.It's a hundred thousand light years side to side.It bulges in the middle, sixteen thousand light years thick,But out by us, it's just three thousand light years wide.We're thirty thousand light years from galactic central point.We go 'round every two hundred million years,And our galaxy is only one of millions of billionsIn this amazing and expanding universe.

The universe itself keeps on expanding and expandingIn all of the directions it can whizzAs fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know,Twelve million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there is.So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,How amazingly unlikely is your birth,And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth.

Right down near the noise floor, just a few pixels wide and all after gravitational lensing to enhance it. Just imagine what might be found with better tech? I'm rooting for the James Webb Space Telescope and keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't end up a smoldering ruin at the bottom of a failed rocket launch or budget cut.

When I think of the universe, I like to think of it contained in a box on the shelf of a really really really huge toy store. Sitting next to the 10 other boxes of universes just waiting for a child to pick it out and take it home.

Darn it! I got tricked into clicking one of his links. Man, that guy is annoying and sucks the brain tickling wonder right out of astronomy. Hasn't gotten any better, it seems.

almandot: probably just some dead hot pixels on their sensor. =PP

FTFY.

Right down near the noise floor, just a few pixels wide and all after gravitational lensing to enhance it. Just imagine what might be found with better tech? I'm rooting for the James Webb Space Telescope and keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't end up a smoldering ruin at the bottom of a failed rocket launch or budget cut.

Wow, so much fun with this comment!

First, it was observed using Hubble and Spitzer, so it's not a hot pixel. Second, they use techniques to minimize that sort of thing - look up "dithering". Third, you don't know what the signal-to-noise is since the paper hasn't been published yet. But it sounds like you can win a million bucks from Randi.

Fourth, assume I just make some "your mom" just here about your personal comment.

I'm in over my head a bit now...but light years have nothing to do with time, right? It is a unit of distance, right? so we don't know how old this galaxy is...the light could have been there for a million years. a billion years, and we just now found it, right? We just know how far away it is, right? Not the exact age?

busy chillin':I'm in over my head a bit now...but light years have nothing to do with time, right? It is a unit of distance, right? so we don't know how old this galaxy is...the light could have been there for a million years. a billion years, and we just now found it, right? We just know how far away it is, right? Not the exact age?

I probably shouldn't have posted, but yet, here we are.

If something is X Billion light years away that means (Barring local spatial anomalies) that that it's been traveling for X billion years and is at this point observable. This establishes an upper limit for the age of the source of the light via Y-X where Y is the calculated age of the universe. As we cannot observe this phenomena before the point we detected it due to the linearity of time we can not determine the lower limit, we can only check it against existing models. If we detect objects +15 billion light years away we will be forced to reexamine this model but currently there's no need.

sp86:busy chillin': I'm in over my head a bit now...but light years have nothing to do with time, right? It is a unit of distance, right? so we don't know how old this galaxy is...the light could have been there for a million years. a billion years, and we just now found it, right? We just know how far away it is, right? Not the exact age?

I probably shouldn't have posted, but yet, here we are.

If something is X Billion light years away that means (Barring local spatial anomalies) that that it's been traveling for X billion years and is at this point observable. This establishes an upper limit for the age of the source of the light via Y-X where Y is the calculated age of the universe. As we cannot observe this phenomena before the point we detected it due to the linearity of time we can not determine the lower limit, we can only check it against existing models. If we detect objects +15 billion light years away we will be forced to reexamine this model but currently there's no need.

Okay, thanks...so my first impression was correct. But then of course this galaxy might no longer exist, but we are still seeing the light, right? But I guess that is neither here nor there.

I love thinking about the edge of the universe...it makes no sense. how can it end? and even if it stops having galaxies and stars there is still dark matter with sub atomic particles. forever. and ever.

it can't end. even if there is nothing there, there is still quarks at the subatomic level. Nothingness is impossible. and if it does end, what is beyond that edge?

I read a book a year or so ago about Edward Hubble and the events that led up to his discoveries. Someone from the time period was quoted in there as saying, and I am grossly paraphrasing here:

"As you imagine yourself moving out the distances being discussed in the scientific community, the scope involved becomes amazing, then incredulous, then disturbing, then ghastly, and finally terrifying."

Meh, not that far away. We can still see it, and some believe we won't be able to see anything from the absolute beginning because the space between us and that light is expanding faster than the speed of light.

busy chillin':sp86: busy chillin':Okay, thanks...so my first impression was correct. But then of course this galaxy might no longer exist, but we are still seeing the light, right? But I guess that is neither here nor there.

I love thinking about the edge of the universe...it makes no sense. how can it end? and even if it stops having galaxies and stars there is still dark matter with sub atomic particles. forever. and ever.

it can't end. even if there is nothing there, there is still quarks at the subatomic level. Nothingness is impossible. and if it does end, what is beyond that edge?

/probably should have quit while I was tied

Option 1:If you go past the outer reaches of known space, there is nothing. No further atomic rendering is completed. You have to reboot the matrix. This is colloquially known as a 'big bang'.

Option 2:It is round. Just how humans thought the earth was flat, and then infinite, before acquiring the technology to see the truth. At the center of each galaxy is a black hole, which causes the gravitational pull against nearby celestial bodies. These holes are portals to other locations within the expanding spherical universe; shortcuts, effectively. Unfortunately, the longer it takes humans to discover FTL tech, the infinitely larger the sphere grows. However, once you circumnavigate the universe, you gain +1 to naval unit movement.

Option 3:Our universe is one of an infinite number of universes that are attached in a dodecahedral tessellation, like a honeycomb. Each new universe is created when the individual honeycombs can no longer hold the quantity of energy contained within (e.g. time travel). When that occurs, they divide, like a cell, creating universes that are exact duplicates of each other, but move forward in time independently of each other. Each additional 'cell' adds to the honeycomb, growing in perpetuity. Thus, you have a potentially infinite number of universes that represent infinite number of historical periods and their resulting actions.